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December Feature - Nick Ibello '07
Growing up in a blue-collar Italian family, I was predisposed to the importance of hard work, grit, and not being handed anything. When I would hear my parents (at a young age) having “discussions” about money related things, I realized that if I wanted to break this financial cycle, I needed to step up and learn more about this “money stuff”. Not only to hopefully help them, but I also realized what a rewarding career path it could be to help other families try and avoid the mistakes my family made with their financial affairs.
My father was steadfast in providing for our large family and worked long hours -- his tenacity and dedication to ‘keep on keeping on’ drove me to follow my passion for financial planning and after getting my Economics degree with a concentration in Finance, I went right to one of the world’s largest asset management institutions, T. Rowe Price (TRP). There I learned all I could about the most popular investment vehicle in existence, the mutual fund, and received sponsorship by TRP to get all my securities licensing.
After spending about 5 years with them, I decided I had the foundational knowledge I wanted to pursue my Certified Financial Planning (CFP) designation and decided to look for a firm that I thought would be a good fit for me (small, boutique, independent, offered comprehensive financial planning).
After door knocking and cold calling for a few weeks, I was given an opportunity to work as a lead financial advisor with Williams Asset Management located in Howard County, MD. At this point, I had zero clients. My boss had a big box (that he had been saving for 20 years) with old “leads” – these were people that said ‘no’ to his offering or he could never get a hold of over his career as an advisor. The box had thousands of pieces of paper in it to go through.
After going through “the box”, learning how to market, hosting dinner seminars and events, attending local expos, putting on financial planning webinars… fast forward 9 years later and I now have the privilege of serving about 190 client households and over $175,000,000 in investments they have entrusted under my stewardship for those households.
It’s been a very humbling and amazing ride, and as I expected back when I was in my teenage years, the career path of being a financial advisor is one of the most rewarding professions there is.
As a final note, I’d be remiss not to mention that I would not be where I am today without a few foundational layers that were instilled in me during my years at Calvert Hall. Things like creating a strong brotherhood amongst your peers (my best friends today are my CHC classmates!), focusing on others (through mentorship and/or giving), working hard and never being shy to lean on your peers for help, teamwork, and comradery, and finally being ethical – always doing what is right above what is easy or convenient. I look back with nostalgia and gratefulness when I think of Calvert Hall and the amazing community therein.
